While cells routinely communicate using chemical signals, they also sense each other through mechanical forces that they exert on each other, either through direct cell-cell contacts or indirectly, through mutual deformations of a compliant, extracellular substrate [1]}, [2]}. Large and measurable substrate deformations [3]} are produced by several cell types that use mechanical forces actively generated by myosin motors in their actin cytoskeleton to change shape, move, and sense their surroundings [4]}. Elastic substrate-mediated intercellular mechanical communication has been demonstrated for several contractile cell types. Endothelial cells modulate their intercellular contact frequency according to substrate stiffness [5]}, cardiomyocytes synchronize their beating with substrate mechanical oscillations induced by a distant probe [6]}, [7]}, and fibroblasts interact at long range through their structural remodeling of fibrous extracellular media [8]}, [9]}.
<FIGURE>